Straight away it can be seen that this episode means business: a new title opening sequence had been devised, and by now the regular cast was almost complete. Only Nigel, the V3 tank engine, had yet to make his first appearance.

It is the first appearance of Scott in apple green (but sadly for the apple green lovers, in the black and sequences!), and with a double tender. This is quite a mistake, but a deliberate one: it was felt by members of the team, that despite the fact the real Flying Scotsman had only appeared with a second tender in the 1960s, and not the 1920s/30s as the black and sequences depict, it did sum up everything about the LNER and so the old Hornby two tender Scotsman was fired up to take part in the episodes. This episode also sees the first and last appearance of the King Class locomotive.

Of all of the episodes, this episode proved beyond reasonable doubt, that good running models are an absolute necessity for filming a series. The old Lima chassis of Hawk was to be replaced for his Episode Eleven return by a Bachmann 57xx alternative, but it was not just poor chassis units: it was not cleaning the track, or wheels of the models enough. Eventually, it became a regular thing: before and after every episode filming session, the locomotives, the rolling stock and the track would be cleaned to make sure that the layout and its models worked perfectly for each session.

This episode caused something of a headache for me after Hawk appeared for his supposed one and only one-off performance (which was my firm mantra, given the old Lima model's bad running qualities), there was a deluge of emails requesting his return. By the time Episode Eight had come around, it was clear that Hawk's stunning popularity was not going to go away, with almost five hundred emails received in total pleading by this point, for his return.

You'll have to go and watch Episode 11 for his return...!